Why Brazil Isn't Ashamed to Exploit Its Oil

Mary Anastasia O'Grady has an excellent article in the WSJ, Why Brazil Isn't Ashamed to Exploit Its Oil. She explains why in detail, but it all boils down to this:

Brazilians understand the importance of energy to their future, while Americans do not.

Allow me to reiterate that: BRAZILIANS UNDERSTAND THE IMPORTANCE OF ENERGY TO THEIR FUTURE, WHILE AMERICANS DO NOT.The difference between the Brazilians, whose environmentalists don't complain about offshore drilling, and the US is that Petrobras is state-owned, and here in the USA oil companies are privately-owned companies, so the socialist environmentalist mindset doesn't complain about the Brazilian approach.

Congress' insistence on the federal ban on offshore oil drilling not only causes short-term effects like high gas prices, but continues to make us increasingly dependent on foreign oil producers, most of which are oppressive tyrannies, several of which also support terrorism.

At least McCain seems to have realized this. McCain Seeks to End Offshore Drilling Ban:

"We must embark on a national mission to eliminate our dependence on foreign oil," McCain told reporters yesterday. In a speech today, he plans to add that "we have untapped oil reserves of at least 21 billion barrels in the United States. But a broad federal moratorium stands in the way of energy exploration and production. . . . It is time for the federal government to lift these restrictions."

Let's hope he wakes up when it comes to ANWR, too.

Obama, however, thinks of oil drilling in these terms:

"John McCain's plan to simply drill our way out of our energy crisis is the same misguided approach backed by President Bush that has failed our families for too long and only serves to benefit the big oil companies,"

Obama doesn't seem to realize that
a. the oil is underground
b. it has to be drilled to get up to the surface
c. that's what oil companies do.
Can we "simply drill our way out of our energy crisis"? YES WE CAN.

McCain also wants federal subsidies to build nuclear power plants. While I normally oppose federal subsidies in general, this kind of large-scale infrastructure development should be a good use of taxpayer monies if appropriately managed.

Obama? He wants more regulation public utilities, and some greenhouse-gas emissions credits auction hocus-pocus. Perhaps it's all part of his Winnie the Pooh approach to things.


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